Oracle 'systematically stiffed its salesforce' claims new sueball

SOP then?

As the Oracle prime directive seems to be 'get as much $$$ by any means and spend as little $$$$ by any means and sue those who get in our way".

Then Larry says, "We aren't making enough so lets kick the sales force in the balls and screw the lot of them into working for us got nothing."

And to think that once upon a time I thought that might like to work for them (shudder)

Yes I heard this too more than once. The sales people, mostly very young college grads now because Hurd won't hire anymore seasoned sales people, are given a yarn and a big dance on how big their commissions will be as that will offset their pittance of a salary. In the end most of these people leave so the company never has to pay out, and those that do stay end up leaving eventually due to being screwed.

I was also told that executive bonuses are paid first then the commissions are paid out afterwards. Hurd, et al, get humungously insane amounts of cash bonuses, and once that's paid out they delay paying the sales people bonuses and then usually find a way to not pay them due to some technicality.

Being the local support tech, I was an ear to lean on when the frustration got pretty high, and I heard this first while I was still there from more than one sales representative, then later on from someone I spoke with at a car repair shop 3 years after I left.

It so happened we were talking about workplaces, and she was an outside sales rep. We talked at length, much to her boyfriend's irk, I think he was jealous, but I got the low down that this crap was true as it was the same as I heard in-house. I also found out that some of the big VPs I supported left as well and went off to places like SAP and SalesForce.

If Hurd keeps it up, he'll turn Oracle into another HP.

Re: "'get as much $$$ by any means and spend as little $$$$ by any means"

>I hate to tell you but that's pretty much SOP for all businesses.

Not quite, while maximizing income and minimizing expense is SOP for all business, the "by any means" part is definitely not

Re: "'get as much $$$ by any means and spend as little $$$$ by any means"

I worked for Big Red in IT for the sales guys and I heard stuff all the time like this. These people don't make as much money as you think, and they will put you in debt in various ways. The sales people get a very small base salary with big promises of making a lot more.

The sales people incur a lot of on the road expenses which are put on corporate credit cards which they themselves will become responsible for if the company does not pay the bill. Now Oracle does not like to pay bills. I found this out the hard way for something really, really small. The process is to put in the expense report with the receipt. Coming from any other company, this is the normal process. You fill out the expense report form, attach mileage, gas, food, and other trip incurred receipts. No brainer... and your manager signs it off.

Oracle it seems likes to jerk off elephants and make the process overly complicated, but it's essentially the same. Using their online system, you insert scanned receipt(s), type up the form and send it off your manager for approval. This takes a day and the process is now in the queue. You're happy you're getting your money back and you can pay the now huge AMEX bill.

Once the approval comes back, you then go back into the submission and click some boxes on the form, and send the package off (again) this time to AP which is located in India.

Do you get your money right away? Nope. Instead you get an email from the useless ones in India stating they didn't get the invoice. You resubmit the invoice... Wait... nope no invoice still can't find it. Oh wait... the submission is wrong you have do it again. This is the same one your own manager has approved, but this jerk-off puts up the circle jerk to stall the process.

Then finally the claim is denied anyway because the submission was done too late for processing!

In my case it was $25.00 because we had a dinner expense. The $25.00 was for one other employee and myself. I sucked it up and dealt with that. But imagine what it's like when you've charged up $100s in airline and travel expenses, as well as other costs, and still get stuck with the bill. When people travel, they can incur $5,000 or more expenses in one shot.

Oracle sucks and I'm glad they got hit again with a lawsuit.

Re: Legality?

That is the method they use... "paid in error" or "overpaid". Most people just accept it because what are you going to do. I have never heard of anyone actually trying it, but I doubt Oracle would actually be able to collect if someone was told they owed $x based on some mid stream comp plan change and that person then left the company with a negative balance. They might be able to not pay you what you think you are owed, as it is technically a discretionary bonus. After it has been paid out though, I don't think they would be able to do anything about it... as it is technically a discretionary bonus. They may send demand letters, etc and hope to scare you into paying, but I don't think they would ever want to take it to court.... The issue, of course, is that most people are not going to be in a position where they can just quit their job with another one lined up for this unexpected situation and then they will get future earnings clawed back.

Looks like Oracle has taken their sales commission plan from Sixteen Tons.

New improved contract

Get used it, since when did business and morallity occupy the same universe.

ps Fox news is characteristically quiet on this fake news

Re: Well that's a first

Having worked closely with sales and marketing people, the good ones are worth their weight in good with a hefty multiplier. They get new business but more importantly they keep existing customers. Smart CEOs know this and try to keep them happy. Screwing your sales force is setting yourself up for failure about 3 - 5 years as the good ones leave and are not replaced. Another point about keeping existing customers, a customer may be more loyal to your ex-sales person than to your company. The relationship was often with a small group of people within your company.

Re: Well that's a first

It's all true. Not only does Oracle stiff nearly ALL of their sales people, sales reps and engineers, men and women alike, they even do so to their new college grads. I just left Oracle recently and was there for less than a year. I encouraged every college hire I worked with to not let Oracle influence their perception of sales or the industry.

When I onboarded, I signed an agreement that stated my bonus would be $X dollars paid out quarterly. I got a small fraction of that. Let's say my bonus was $100 per quarter, I got something more like $20. That was common amongst all of the sales people I'd worked with. They set unrealistic goals for their sales people and treat customers like garbage. I've seen upper management change everybody's bonus structure and I've seen other people have their base salaries adjusted without reason. The way that upper management isolated themselves in their executive bubble swimming in the cash that we (the sales people) earned for them was deplorable. I felt genuinely bad for their customers; sales reps were put in positions where they would have to request audits for their accounts so that they could actually make some money to pay their bills at the cost of their customer's trust.

Oracle probably doesn't realize this but they're developing an army of sales people to sell against them not just due to their profession but out of passion.

If you're currently evaluating an Oracle solution, do yourself, your peers, your company, and your customers a favor and continue looking.

If you're currently a sales person at Oracle, you understand what I'm talking about. Build up a good resume and search for other opportunities quickly. Most employers understand that Oracle is a terrible company.